On Friday afternoon I made a presentation unlike any I have ever made. The theme was Missional Worship & the Arts and the idea of the presentation was to give instruction concerning artistic possibilities and then to demonstrate some of those options.
Music was among my first loves and became my first profession, and it was through music that I entered ministry as music director of a church plant back in 1985. I spent years as a worship leader, creative director, resident musician through seminary, training conference worship leader, and eventual pastor who doubled as worship leader, making sure that the pastor and the worship leader were on the same page!
In recent years my music opportunities have been few and far between, but I have continued to write songs and bang away on my piano with only God as an audience, assuming He was listening.
The presentation included original music, worship songs (older and newer), hymns, drama sketches, special readings, a reading chorus, lots of Scripture, a unison prayer of confession, plus a few short lectures about various considerations from the use of theatre to the nuts of bolts of a worship leader’s role during a worship service.
There were 200 or so in attendance who seemed genuinely moved by the presentation and who actively participated at the appropriate places. That’s really all that I was shooting for, but the response went much further than expected. Many came up to me afterwards with a myriad of follow up questions and with invitations to train worship leaders and their teams.
It seems that I have stumbled upon a need and an interest that I have never formally addressed before, but am seriously considering now. As I have processed questions and considered what I might offer in the way of insight and training, the idea of publishing a worship leader guide of some sort has surfaced. God has been nudging me to get music back into my ministry but I never envisioned what popped up over the weekend.
I am at least going to test the waters by putting the outline of a guide together and by seeing who really comes through with invitations. Perhaps it was the heat of the moment, but maybe Providence is at work. We’ll see!
